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A comment on Memory of Mankind: All of Human Knowledge Buried in a Salt Mine. Parent comment

Re:Memory of Mankind: All of Human Knowledge Buried in a Sal... by the8472 on Thursday January 19, 2017 @06:33PM (#13440461)
No, there are many deserts far older than human agriculture. Humans are reponsible for some desertification, but often that's just making existing deserts worse/larger.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Namib_Desert

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Re:Memory of Mankind: All of Human Knowledge Buried in a Sal... by flukus on Thursday January 19, 2017 @06:42PM (#13440502)
> Having endured arid or semi-arid conditions for roughly 55–80 million years, the Namib may be the oldest desert in the world[1][3]

Wow. Just to put that in perspective, it was a desert when North America was still joined to Europe, India wasn't and Australia was an Antarctic appendage:

http://www.bobspixels.com/kaibab.org/geology/gc065mya.htm

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